


Consolation

by pretzel_anna



Category: The Beatles (Band)
Genre: Angst, Best Friends, Dark, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Falling In Love, Friendship, John is a Good Friend, M/M, Psychological Torture, Suicidal Thoughts, True Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-26
Updated: 2019-09-26
Packaged: 2020-10-30 21:49:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,618
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20780489
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pretzel_anna/pseuds/pretzel_anna
Summary: Afterwards John found some of Paul's books and magazines about the mental disorders again. He didn't know that Paul really wanted to cure, but not him, not George or anybody else.Paul wanted to cure himself.





	Consolation

Paul laughs. His loud and rolling laughter echoes in the emptied club. He was supposed to calm down just three minutes ago, almost immediately after the dirty comment that John has made about one of the fangirls, but it didn't come. He frets, as if in fever, his cheeks are red, and there is a desperate madness in his eyes.

John drags him in the toilet without knowing how to deal with him and expecting that after all Paul will accept a decision and settle down. Maybe it's all from the pills. Sometimes he has seizures like that too, but Paul has put him completely in the shade today.

John opens an old frail door and pushes Paul. He doesn't protest or mind, and John hears with relief that his laughter has became more soft and muted. However, in the next moment John realizes that Paul sobs.

"Calm the fuck down," he hisses, shaking Paul by the shoulders, but his friend breaks forth from his grip. "What's the matter with you lately?"

"You know," Paul answers.

"No, son. How can I know it?" John mutters.

"You know!" Paul replicates and goes down on the floor slowly, but John catches him timely.

They look into each other's eyes.

_"I just want to sort myself out,"_ Paul whispers huskily through his tears._ "I'm so terrified."_

John flinches in understanding. He had to work on this case earlier, and now he scolds himself a thousand times for trusting to chance. Memories shimmer in his head like the little dim lights. He remembers the day when he has found a few cheap psychiatric books under the Paul's pillow.

"So you are not a musician any more, you are a doctor, Macca?" he asked Paul with a grin playing on his lips. "Who are you going to cure? Me? George?"

"Please, get off, it's none of your business," Paul snatched the books out of his friend's hands and clutched them to his chest.

"Ah-ah," John laughed.

Afterwards John found some of Paul's books and magazines about the mental disorders again. He didn't know that Paul really wanted to cure, but not him, not George or anybody else.

Paul wanted to cure himself.

Now he stands in front of him and bats his wet eyelashes, totally broken.

"I'm sorry," John says, never knowing to end what he means, and looks Paul in the eye. Paul's fathomless eyes has turned into the dark pits. John can't guess whether it's from the pills or anything else.

Suddenly Paul smiles, and John shivers. Paul laughs soundlessly, looking ahead. Then he falls silent and sobs again.

"I'm so sorry," John says once again.

They stand all alone in this foolish dirty toilet and say nothing. Paul still trembles when he turns to the tap and sticks it on.

"I can bring you..." John starts, but Paul cuts him off in the middle of a sentence with a tired gesture and bends over to water, swallowing it greedily. Then he raises his head and looks at himself in the dim and spat mirror hanging over the sink.

It's the first time John notices how different they are. Paul peers into the reflection, just like trying to see something, and exhales.

_"I don't recognize myself."_

John’s heart beats heavily in his rib cage, anxiety rises in his throat.

"Tell me, have I changed?" Paul asks without turning around, but looking into John’s reflection's eyes in the mirror.

"You're the same, dear."

John doesn't like this "dear" which sounds too mawkish, but he can't choose anything better. Some words appear in his head, "my love" and other things like that, but even now he can't afford to say one of them.

"You're lying." Paul cuts off, and John understands that he isn't able to bear this torture anymore.

John jumps to Paul, turns him around and looks him straight in the eyes, grabbing him by his shirt.

_Paul has really changed._

"You're this same Paul McCartney, my old friend and a terrible bore, can you hear me?!"

It seems to John that his voice thunders, but actually he half whispers all of these words.

"No!" suddenly Paul pushes him with a force. "Go away!"

"What?" John stares at his friend, absolutely stunned.

A long garland of memories lights up in his head, and its lightbulbs alternately glow with different colours. He remembers how they went to his mother after school and drunk tea. How they spent time at Paul's home listening to Elvis and Buddy. How Paul taught him to play the guitar. How they came to club to be hired as musicians. That time Paul lied about his age, and afterwards John often teased him because of it.

Maybe he teased him even too often.

"It's my fault," John says, his voice is foreign and strange, and he's astonished at his own frankness. It's all too bad if he shoots the works. "I had to see something was wrong with you."

"I'm so tired, Johnny," suddenly Paul says. "It's like I'm fading each day, do you understand me? I feel like I'm falling into this dirty hole. You know, I lose control. I wanted to find the answers to my questions, reading all of those books, but I don't know what to do."

Paul sobs and cries again.

"I know that I can't get help from anywhere," he says, tears in his throat. "I tried to cure myself, but I'm hopeless. I really want to be that clean, Johnny. It seems to me that my life is not what it ought to be. I wish I could be good, I want that good, but how can I do that if everyone is a stranger? I burnt out, Johnny, burnt out like a candle. And there is only a snuff that can only fume. I can't exist like that any more."

Paul goes down on the cold and filthy floor, totally exhasted, with his hands in front of his face. John goes to him and sits down nearby. Then he touches Paul's face very gently, feeling that it's wet from tears and water, and slowly kisses one of his cheeks.

Paul doesn't react. It seems he doesn't care.

"Hey, Paul," John whispers softly, but Paul still looks the other way, absolutely silent. "I won't leave you."

John wants to say something else, something that is important and great, but the words are getting lost. He does not understand whence the power appears in Paul when he suddenly jumps on and starts screaming.

John stands up and the Paul's speech joins the noise in his ears. Paul pushes him and then he eventually makes out his words: "Go away, get out, get out!"

John feels that he goes crazy, moves back to the door and comes out of the toilet.

He stops in the corridor, clinging his back to the cold wall. He looks meditative with his eyes closed but actually there is no a single thought in his head. His lips murmur something soundlessly – it's a prayer that he and he alone knows or Paul's name – it's impossible to tell it properly. Suddenly he hears a strange sound, just like something has crashed. John opens his eyes being in a complete prostration. At first he thinks that this sound has only seemed to him, but then he comes up with the idea that this is not the case. He runs through the corridor like hell and flies into the toilet, barely ripped the door off the hinges.

Paul lies on the cold tile floor. There are a fragment of the mirror in his injured hand and the bloody red strips on his wrist.

***

It's bright in a hospital. The sun's rays dance merrily on the crystal-white floor, and John looks ridiculous in his black leather among this cleanliness.

He will see Paul today. Anxiety rises in his throat. John thinks what he should say, but he can't find any words. Eventually he may come in the chamber.

Paul lies in bed, looking in the window. Then he turns his head to John and stares at him. They're in silence. John takes a chair, totally white like everything in this hospital, and sits down.

"Hello, Paul."

"Hello, John."

There comes silence again.

"Why have you done that?" John asks.

Paul grins.

"I wanted to end all of that."

"Why?"

Paul's grin becomes bigger.

"Frankly, I barely remember what happened between us that night. I remember only some of the fragments."

John thinks if Paul remembers his kiss, but in the next moment he drives this thought away. Suddenly Paul rises in his bed.

"I want you to hug me. Please."

John is astonished, but he hugs Paul in a second.

"I'm so fine when you're around. I feel like in my childhood, I feel I'm protected."

John remembers what Paul was that night and wants to say something, but keeps silent.

"Will I recover, John?" Paul asks.

John sees all of those books about mental disorders again, he hears the taunts he has said about Paul, and the words "Go away, get out, get out!" But in the next second it all disappears, and there is something new in this world, beautiful and strange. He sees a hospital's window with its wonderful view of the garden. A lot of voices come to his ears: a birds chirping, a wind noise, and all of these sounds merge into a single call of life. He embraces Paul, who is so warm and full of something which's absolutely opposite to death. John feels his breath on his neck and says confidently:

_"Yes, Paul. You will surely sort yourself out and recover. Everything will be fine."_

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks a lot for reading my first work here! English is not my native language actually, so I'm afraid there are some mistakes. Anyway, I would be extremely happy to get a comment from you!  
And I've gotta say that I was inspired by Depeche Mode's song Black Celebration, so there is such a title of this fic🖤


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